Welcome

Dear College of Arts and Letters Community,

Welcome to the first iteration of the College of Arts and Letters Accessibility and Inclusion newsletter. Here you will find important information and updates about accessibility standards, news related to access and inclusion efforts in the college, support and learning programming across the university, and highlights about available resources to help you expand your inclusive practices.

Thank you,
Caitlin Cornell

Introducing the Accessibility Coordinator and Advocate  

Dr. Caitlin Cornell (she/her) is the Accessibility Coordinator and Advocate for the College of Arts and Letters (CAL). In her role, she will lead disability inclusion strategy in the college, support faculty and teaching assistants in their inclusive teaching practices, and advocate for disabled faculty, staff, and students.

Meet the CAL Accessibility and Inclusion Team

Many people and departments across the university contribute to CAL access and inclusion efforts. Our core team is represented on the new (and still under construction) CAL Accessibility and Inclusion home page so you can get in touch when you need to.

Email our team at access@cal.msu.edu. 

Access Spotlight

Digital Accessibility Compliance Deadlines

By the federal deadline of April 24, 2026, all digital content (e.g., websites, learning management systems like D2L) must comply with WCAG 2.1 AA standards. For more context, here is a helpful overview from the Online Learning Consortium.

MSU set its own internal deadline that all new digital content created after January 1, 2026 needs to comply with WCAG 2.2 AA standards. See MSU's technical guidelines for more information (in particular, refer to support sites in the right-hand menu on that page).

MSU resources related to ADA Compliance for Digital Accessibility

The Office of the ADA Coordinator (for information relevant to the upcoming federal deadline, scroll down to the Digital Accessibility section).

The College of Arts and Letters Accessibility and Inclusion team will be hosting workshops and drop-in support options for faculty–including teaching assistants–this semester (more details in the section below).

Support and Learning

Here are some highlights of upcoming support and learning opportunities like workshops, webinars, and drop-in sessions across CAL, MSU, and beyond. Browse more support engagements on the CAL Accessibility and Inclusion web page.

Introduction to Course Accessibility

February 9, 2026

12:00-1:00pm Eastern

In person; B243 Wells Hall

Scott Schopieray and Caitlin Cornell will outline the importance of course accessibility, including but not limited to digital accessibility in the context of the approaching federal deadline 4/24/26. Participants will explore some common course accessibility concerns and some simple solutions, discuss next steps in their inclusive practices, and identify some helpful resources. 

No pre-registration is required for the Intro to Course Accessibility in-person workshop.

Introduction to Course Accessibility

February 20, 2026

12:30-1:30pm Eastern

Virtual

Scott Schopieray and Caitlin Cornell will outline the importance of course accessibility, including but not limited to digital accessibility in the context of the approaching federal deadline 4/24/26. Participants will explore some common course accessibility concerns and some simple solutions, discuss next steps in their inclusive practices, and identify some helpful resources. 

Register for the Intro to Course Accessibility Virtual Workshop

Drop-In Course Accessibility Support

March 10, 2026

2:00-3:00pm Eastern

Virtual

Need help making your D2L course more accessible? Members of the CAL Accessibility and Inclusion team will be on hand to answer your questions and troubleshoot specific operations.  

Register for the Drop-In Course Accessibility Support Session

Resource Highlight

PAVE tool

PDFs are notoriously inaccessible. Our team has moved away from using PDFs for that reason, and we advise you to try that, too. 

In the meantime, as you think about what it will take to present your PDF content in news ways, the PAVE 2.0 PDF remediation tool is a simple way to render more accessible PDFs. Just upload your document, and the tool will give you a more accessible version of it!

More resources

Visit the resources section of the CAL Accessibility and Inclusion home page to discover additional resources.

Weekly tip email - coming soon!

Soon, you will be able to subscribe to our weekly "tidbits" email with a handy accessibility tip of the week! Emails will be sent from access@cal.msu.edu.

Contact us!

Have a question about accessibility and disability inclusion, a suggestion for accessibility support in the college, or a topic to highlight in a future newsletter? 

Email our team at access@cal.msu.edu.